In recent years, there is on-going research and development of variable resistance nonvolatile memory devices (also simply referred to as a “nonvolatile memory device”) which have a memory cell configured with a variable resistance nonvolatile memory element (Hereinafter, also simply referred to as a “variable resistance element”) (for example, see Patent Literatures (PTLs) 1, 2, and 3 and Non-Patent Literature (NPL) 1).
Here, the variable resistance element refers to an element which has property that a resistance value reversibly changes depending on an electric signal, and additionally, is able to store data corresponding to the resistance value in a nonvolatile fashion.